Could Adrian Ramos or Stefan Kiessling be the answer to Arsenal’s striker hunt? The stats suggest so

Crying out for help: Arsene Wenger is currently short of recognised firepower (Picture: Getty Images)

With Arsenal seemingly no closer to signing a striker after almost five months of searching since the close of the summer transfer window, Metro’s Massimo Marioni examines the stats to pinpoint two realistic players the Gunners could sign to help boost their title chances.

1. ‘There’s nobody out there who can significantly improve on what we’ve got.’

2. ‘Give us some names of realistic targets we could sign.’

In response to No.1, the argument that there is no one out there who is significantly better than Nicklas Bendtner is a non-starter and that is what Arsene Wenger’s priority should be; buying someone to help/cover/compete with Olivier Giroud – not replace him.

If you’re entering the second half of the season with Bendtner as your first reserve, you’re relying on blind luck more than common sense.

This brings us to No.2: who can Arsenal realistically sign who could have a positive impact this season?

When considering Arsenal’s style of play, and the role Giroud successfully fulfils, you have to consider a number of key indicators which make a prospective target appropriate.

Presence, strength, finishing, touch, awareness and vision are the key traits a striker leading the line for this Arsenal side must possess.

Whilst all of these traits are impossible to assess via stats alone, there are indicators which can give you a pretty accurate idea if someone would be a suitable fit.

Goals are the obvious benchmark to which all strikers are measured against, and can act as a good gauge of finishing ability.

Height and weight can be reasonable indicators of presence and strength, as can the number of times opposition need to resort to illegal measures to bring that player down i.e. number of times fouled per game.

Success in aerial duels is another crucial part to a lone striker’s role, while pass success and key passes per game demonstrates vision, awareness and accuracy.

Finally, the ability to retain possession in the final third is key, and requires good touch and ability on the ball – in addition to simply strength. Therefore the amount of times a player is dispossessed, is a handy barometer, as the less frequently he is dispossessed, the better touch and ability you would assume he has (to give you an idea, Lionel Messi is only dispossessed 1.3 times per game, Cristiano Ronaldo 1.6, Zlatan Ibrahimovic 1.9).

If given a choice, most Arsenal fans would kill for a world-class striker like Ibrahimovic or Robert Lewandowski, but when their key indicators are examined against lower profile, obtainable alternatives like Adrian Ramos of Hertha Berlin or Stefan Kießling of Bayer Leverkusen, the more glaringly obvious it becomes that there ARE quality options out there for Wenger to pursue.

Ramos’ contract expires in 2015, and he’s been tipped by Lothar Matthaus to replace Lewandowski at Dortmund when the Pole joins Bayern Munich.

Kießling, while older, has proven himself as one of the most lethal marksmen in the Bundesliga over the past three years, and has been at Leverkusen since 2006, with this contract running until 2017.

Both players should be comfortably obtainable targets for a club of the size, and with the ambitions of Arsenal, and both should, in theory, significantly improve the current options at Wenger’s disposal.

While I don’t have any knowledge on the character of either player – which is also a crucial part of the recruitment process – this brief and simplistic venture into the world of talent identification proves there are answers to Arsenal fans’ questions.

So the question remains; why are Wenger and his global army of scouts still playing Russian roulette with Arsenal’s title chances?